Heartbroken
by Camilla10
Summary: On Isle Esme Edward feels compelled to share with Bella something about his past and his sexuality. Slightly OOC.  " I knew that, had he wanted me in his bed, I would have gone along ... " NOMINATED FOR THE SUNFLOWER AWARDS 2011
1. Chapter 1

**Heartbroken****, by Camilla10**

Story notes

Heartbroken is part of my series "Growth".

This plot bunny – an idea planted on me by Maniac Motherland - did not want to go away. So the sequel of the Parachutist had to wait a little, while I dealt with it. Well, it is not even a plot, just a dialogue in two parts, with Edward speaking a lot and confessing something. It is slightly OOC, because we must assume that Edward, during his honeymoon becomes so sure of himself as to be able to share with Bella some intimate secrets. In The Unicorn in the Blue room I made Bella tell Edward something very intimate about herself, (It is a short one shot, you can read it, if you wish) and here he reciprocates, sort of. As for the content, well, Stephenie Meyer did not tell us, but some of us wondered, and there are a few good stories that go there.

Stephenie Meyer owns everything Twilight, I only like to go deep in the heads of her characters, where she did not always go.

Thanks to Maniac Motherland, to Serendipitous who reads my chapters and encourages me and to Stefanie the Hobbit Ivy, who hunts my smaller mistakes and destroys them.

Chapter 1 – Secrets

_So__, E&B are on Isle Esme, the Blue Room night happened already, and (another thing that SM did not clarify) we must suppose that they have a few more days of total bliss, before the little nudger makes herself known._

"Love, come for me." And, while his two fingers pump deliciously inside her, his thumb presses… there and she shatters in bliss. Again. His smile is triumphant. Bella can't believe that this sparkling demigod, naked under the tropical sun and embracing her, is hers and is devoting himself to her pleasure. She has lost count of her… (just to say the word 'orgasm' in her mind still makes her blush) but, that is what they are. How can he be the same Edward that just a few weeks ago disentangled himself from her when kisses became too heated? Who wanted to relent, once, but was happy enough to wait when she decided to embrace his antiquated point of view? Who was so terrified of his strength that, after the first night, tried to put a stop to intercourse, just for a few irrelevant bruises?

But then something shifted, and now… he can't help himself, apparently. It is early morning, the sunrays still slanted; they are on the beach in front of the house, laying over a spread of terry towels and beach cushions. He said that later the sun will be too hot, so they had a quick dip, the turquoise water cool and refreshing, and then he started worshipping her… Yes, he is worshipping **her. **But, what about him? Is he still afraid of letting himself go? Now that he has found a way to channel part of his strength elsewhere (as the poor headboard testifies) certainly it shouldn't be an issue anymore.

Because things between them have changed so much, she is bold enough to speak up.

"Mr. Cullen, this is not right. You are not getting any." And, crap, she blushes.

"Oh, I will, Mrs. Cullen, I will, but I think I owe you."

"What?"

"My beautiful Bella, I owe you a lot (kiss), for the idiot (lick behind her ear) I have been; denying you (mouth lightly sucking her throat), and myself, for so long."

When his lips descend on her nipple, this particular conversation has to stop. Self-denial stops too, and after a short while they are joined, she on top because there is no headboard here or nothing hard (well, there is something hard) for him to grasp and manhandle, so he hopes this position is safer.. His blushing bride of just a few days rides him with wild abandon, they come together and his control doesn't wane… God, it is glorious.. _She_ is glorious and makes him feel like a new being, reborn between her legs, and he is happy as he never thought he could be, a man to his woman, a lover, not a killer.

Later, because he loves her so much and all his inhibitions have gone down the drain, he thinks he owes her something else, a part of his past he has never disclosed to anybody, not even to Carlisle; particularly **not** to Carlisle.

"One thing I can say with certainty," he declares, "not only I am not gay, I am not neuter either."

"Who said you were?" Bella asks, surprised.

"I did. I mean, for a quite a long time I wondered what I was, sexually speaking. Mostly I thought I was neuter, but sometimes I thought I was gay. When I decided I was not, that I was, in fact, neuter, Jasper and Emmet still wondered, sometimes. And Rosalie … she could not understand why I was not attracted to her. Only in Alice's mind I found always the promise that one day I would be happy and in love. The gender of my mate was not specified but, when all is said and done, our family is very conventional in those matters."

"But why?" She is confused, in the months before their wedding she was the forward one, while he had placed strict boundaries against intimacy, but only for her safety, he maintained. Bella came to believe him, because more than once she had felt his restrained passion, and, yes, his hard arousal when they were together. Eventually she seduced him into trying, as he seduced her into marrying him first. And try they did, and they succeeded, beyond her wildest dreams.

Some time passes, he is looking into space, his face so soft and beautiful that almost hurts her. He speaks dreamily:

"You know? If Carlisle had wanted me in that way, in our first years together, I would have gone for it."

She gulps, stunned.

"You and... Carlisle?"

He chuckles.

"Am I scandalizing you, Bella, is the Victorian surprising you? I'll explain, then. It is my deepest secret, but I have given myself to you completely and this is part of what I am."

He tightens his arms around her, kissing her brow, her lips, nuzzling her neck and speaking low, his voice like smooth silk:

"Try to imagine what we were, then. Two people completely alone in the world. The secret that we had to keep made us more alone than if we were on a desert Island. Carlisle had his work, however. I had nothing. Human memories fading, once my blood lust abated there was only him. I loved him. He was… sire, mentor, companion, brother, he protected me from myself, my newborn cravings and my fury, he was everything to me. Not a father, however, that came later… when I came back to him.

"I knew what homosexuality was. There is always somebody among your schoolmates that informs you, normally with coarse jokes or innuendos about people suspected to be gay. That left me properly repelled, like the proper little gentleman I was.

"It is not that I really wanted to be intimate with Carlisle, I felt no stirrings in that sense, but he was, after all, a man, older than me in human years, mature. How was it possible that he was immune from carnal desires? Living chastely for more than two centuries? I wondered if, at the bottom of his decision to change me, that had been his purpose and he had wanted not a companion but a lover… And if he wanted a lover, why did he not change a woman, unless… I believed that it was a sinful and unnatural behavior but, it did not signify. I was unnatural already, a monster, surely damned anyway. I had killed once, in my first days as a newborn, and I hated myself for it and for the pleasure I had felt while I drained the unfortunate passerby.

"So I searched his guarded mind, I tried to discover what he wanted and came up with nothing. Oh, he loved me too, with tenderness and guilt, for what he had done to me. He could not condone his selfishness, and was trying his utmost to give me anything that would make me, if not happy, at least less unhappy. And, as I found him handsome, he found me very pleasant to the eye too … but it was only an aesthetic concept, nothing more. No sexual desires that I could see. At first, I was relieved. I knew that, had he wanted me in his bed, I would have gone along, exactly as I went along with his feeding choice, despite the cravings I tried to conceal from him. I wanted him to approve of me; I would do nothing to endanger our relationship. "

Edward stops speaking for a while, but Bella realizes that he is far from finished. And she wants him to continue, because he is giving her an extraordinary gift, a piece of himself that nobody knows. Even if it is going to hurt, she wants to hear it, because she wants all that comprises Edward Cullen, her vampire, her husband.

"Eventually I convinced myself that chastity was the natural choice for us. Obviously we could not consort with immortal females who fed on men, so we would walk this hearth together, chaste and sexless like angels – well dark angels, if you will, but anyway. We would try to give something back to the humans our kind preyed upon. Carlisle had made of medicine his mission, I could follow his steps, maybe … or, if the lure of blood was too much for me, medical research or pharmacology could be the answer ….

"So far, so good, until, suddenly, there was Esme.

"At first I could not understand why he had changed her. She was broken, had lost her baby, her husband was an abusive jerk, she was better dead, I thought. Carlisle was very careful to cover his reasons, and in any case, we had our hands full. Twice, she escaped us and killed, becoming devastated afterwards. Carlisle was devastated too, he felt the responsibility, and for him it was as if he had murdered her victims himself, by turning her. In her overexcited newborn mind I found something unexpected, though. She had met him ten years before, when she was a teenager and he had treated her broken leg. They had spoken quite a lot and she hero-worshipped him, so different from the banality of her parents and relatives. Like me, she was awed by him and hated to have disappointed him. As I shared her feelings, I did all that I could to help her and we became quite close, being together most of the time, when Carlisle felt he could safely go back to his work.

"Two brothers and a beloved sister then? Well, not for long. Carlisle's control on his mind was slipping. He was looking at her, one night, and the thoughts I got from him were not brotherly ones. No chaste at all. He wanted her. He had wanted her, loved her in fact, even when she was human and it was impossible – yeah, this is what a 'good' vampire normally thinks, as you well know, Bella – but now, now it would be possible.

"He courted her, and how could anybody resist him? In a short while they were both passionately in love. It was doubtful if they could marry, as her husband was still alive – a moot point anyway, albeit for a short shocking moment he even thought of killing him, because she felt she was not free to reciprocate. Ridiculous, I know, and eventually Esme also saw it, and they became lovers. Her husband did not live for long, anyway, so they married properly, later on.

"In the meanwhile, my descent into hell had begun. I felt as if I had been thrown away, discarded. I was no longer the most important person in Carlisle's life, she was. At first I was ashamed. They should not know of my jealousy. Yes, that was what it was, and it was not something I was supposed to feel. But, when they became intimate, it destroyed me. I could hear them and I could hear their minds. I tried to go for runs at night, I tried to drown sounds in music…I had a piano by then, to no avail. Even if I was not in the house when they went at it, the memory of their lovemaking filled their minds all the time. I was not yet adept at closing my inner ears, so I learned everything about sex, a tutoring I thought I would have done well without. They were lusty, they were inventive, they appeared shameless to my prude self. I was repelled… and curious too, of course. I was a peeping Tom of the worst kind.

"I hated myself, I hated them both, but most of all I hated Carlisle. He had damned me to this existence and the instincts that came with it, he had led me believe that we were meant to be chaste, and now he wasn't. Worst of all, he had made me abstain from the only sustenance proper for a vampire. And I had obeyed him, fool that I was, thinking that in exchange I would get his friendship and his love. But now I had lost him.

"Indeed I was a fool, but for other reasons," Edward says, cupping Bella face and kissing the tip of her nose, "I was too immature to understand that there are many different kinds of love and one does not necessarily oust the other."

Jacob's face pops up in Bella's mind while he speaks and she is happy once more that he can't read her thoughts, until she realizes that Jacob is exactly what Edward is hinting at, and that his anger over it is long gone.

He continues speaking, however:

"I think my heart broke then. An unbeating heart could still be broken. I needed to leave them, every day was torture and I did not know how long I would be able to hide my jealousy. To keep it concealed, I let myself get angry about other issues. I berated Carlisle on religion, deriding his faith and his hopes for salvation and, finally, his diet. I was done with it, there was no point; I would go away and finally feed as I was meant to feed."

Edward sits up.

"Come, beautiful girl. The sun is getting hot and you'll be burned if you don't go inside…" He carries her bridal style into the kitchen and rummages into the fridge for a cup of cut fruit left from her early breakfast. He insists to hand-feeding her and she allows for it, because she can feel how distressed he is, coming to the last part of his confession. He has not forgiven himself for his vigilante years and never will, probably.

Edward carries her into the blue room and she thinks that maybe she should put on something, but it is too hot inside, so they get into the bed naked as they are and he spoons her, his body cool and delicious against hers. She realizes that he intends to continue and in this way he is hiding his face from her.

"You know how it went," he resumes, "you know that eventually I became the monster I had chosen to be, the only redeeming factor being that I could read minds and select criminals for my meals.

"You know also that the more I went on, the unhappier I was. I fed on the dregs of society and it poisoned me, till the pleasure of human blood started waning. Not at the beginning, mind you. At the beginning I felt like a superhero. I was strong, invincible; I could administer justice like ineffectual humans couldn't, knowing that the men I took down were all guilty and deserving death.

"What you don't know, what I discovered, was the arousing effect human blood drinking has on us. I experienced it and it took some time to abate, afterwards, because I was so appalled and naïve that I didn't do anything about it…"

God, he is speaking about masturbation, something he never spoke about before. Bella is blushing, and excited too. She would like to ask him something, if she finds the courage for it, but Edward is speaking again:

"You see, the humans I hunted were all men. I don't doubt evil women existed, but they did not prowl the streets, and I never met one I felt I should kill… Mostly, they were the victims of evil men. So, my preys were all male, and if men had that effect on me… maybe I was gay indeed. I could not reconcile myself with what my body seemed to tell me but, what did I know? So I decided to try, and be certain."

Bella gasps and cannot hide it from him. Did he, did he really…?

End notes

What do you think? Please let me know.

Strictly speaking Edward is …Edwardian, but King Edward was a womanizer, while the values our vamp adheres to are in fact Victorian.

I am reading some good stories on Twilighted net. Here they are:

Through his Eyes by RedSummer

A retelling of Twilight, sort of. Edward is confused between love, lust and a fiery bloodlust. Instead of running to Denali he confides in Carlisle, and Carlisle confides in him. Apparently, he too found his singer, once... and he was a man. BTW, this Edward is a virgin, but not innocent and not a prude. Exceptionally well written.

Amnesia, by Gemgirl

Present time. Like Alice in the Saga, Edward wakes up a vampire, but does not remember anything. Bites Bella who happens to be in the forest, but he does not kill her and she is not turned (there is a mystery here). Then he starts to figure out a little, and meets the Cullens. The nice thing is that this Edward, not having endured a century of brooding and guilt, is nicely modern and very likeable.

For whom the Bell tolls, by Cyra Bear

There is a bookshop where Bella happens by chance, with a very beautiful, and very pale owner ... Very cultured and intriguing, so far.


	2. Chapter 2  Gay or neuter?

**Heartbroken, by Camilla10**

Chapter 2 . Gay or neuter?

Previously

_So, my preys were all male, and if men had that effect on me … maybe I was gay indeed. I could not reconcile myself with what my body seemed to tell me but, what did I know? So I decided to try, and be certain."_

_Bella gasps and cannot hide it from him. Did he, did he really…?_

He moves his arms, turning her so that they are now facing each other, and she sees that he is smiling, a very impish smile.

"Worried, love? I'll tell you how it went. Certainly I was not going to try with a human, because I would surely kill him, during or afterwards, and if he was a good person I should not, and if he was evil, I could not go with him. Disgusting.

"There are gay vampires, of course. The Volturi use some of them to lure people to Volterra, as sexual preferences vary. Eventually I met one, who had come to the US on a mission and now was in New York waiting to take a ship back to Italy. Well, to cut a long story short, we met by chance, recognized we were both immortals and, because he needed it before his journey, we went hunting together. I asked him to follow my lead, without telling him of my mind reading gift, obviously. The Volturi know of it now only because I have been so stupid as to go to them. I just maintained that I knew the turf better than him and it made sense. He was very attractive, by the way, all lures are, and I saw he found me attractive too. Anyway, we happened upon two hit men for the Mob, coming back from their assignment and counting their reward in their minds. They never reached the speakeasy they were directed to.

"We drained them in a deserted warehouse and the familiar stirring made itself known. He came to me and put his hand on me in lust, his mind full of images of what we were going to do together and… my arousal abated immediately. I could not do it, I didn't want to do it. I mumbled excuses and fled. So much for gay.

"Eventually I decided that those moments of sexual excitement were just a side effect of the hunt, a physical reaction, nothing more and nothing that could end up in intercourse. I decided I was neuter, that was it and I would be alone forever unless…

"I missed Carlisle, and, hell, I missed Esme too. The realities I had been seeing in human minds since I left made it clear that what I had unwittingly witnessed of their intimacy should not have bothered me. Disrespect, cruelty, rape even… indeed there were worse things than that."

"Plus, what I was doing was sickening. I was a hypocritical monster, a glutton, no better than those I was hunting. And, if I was surely damned, I was also damning them with me. By terminating their life I made sure that none of them had the possibility of redemption. Finally, the arousal that followed the hunt was disgusting. I had to stop, I wanted to stop, and eventually I did stop, resorting to animals again.

"When my eyes changed color I felt I was ready to go back to the only family I had, if they wanted me. And they did. I confessed my sins to Carlisle and tried to explain why I had repented, keeping from him the sexual angle. Of the reasons why I had left I didn't speak at all, and he did not ask. The similarity with the parable of the Prodigal Son was not lost on us, either. He had changed, marriage evidently suited him and he was at the same time serene, gentler and more authoritative, if that was possible. I found myself sliding in a son's role, even letting Esme mother me. I realized that I was loved and I was comforted. As far as that was possible.

"Well, after a short while the family started growing. Rosalie was not for me, a real mistake on Carlisle's part, then Emmett, probably the happiest vampire in the world, lightening our daily existence with his pranks and his goodness… then Jasper and Alice, with whom I bonded immediately. Our gifts set us apart and we understood each other perfectly.

"During one of our moves we got to Alaska and there I met Tanya, an old friend of Carlisle. She wanted me and everybody hoped that I would finally find a companion, if not a mate, because they could well see that my life, alone among passionate couples, was not easy. Well, love, you have seen her and you know she is beautiful, so I decided to let her experiment with me. I allowed her some freedom and she did try, um, to awaken me. My lack of response was spectacular, something a succubus rarely experiences, so, extremely disappointed, she gave me up, both of us convinced that I was destined to be alone forever. This is why she took so badly to the idea that I am mated to you, a human."

Bella freezes while he is speaking of Tanya. Strangely, hearing from his lips how he killed two gangsters in a warehouse – he never went into the details of his murderous past before - has left her unaffected, but Tanya, now... In the way she had naively understood it, he had simply 'let her know that he was not interested', but now she realizes that such knowledge was factual, that the slut made free of his body, kissed him, touched him intimately… A hot wave of jealousy takes her, she fights it, but can't control her ragged breath and Edward understands what she is feeling.

"Forgive me, love, but I will not lie to you. Never again. This sorry vampire specimen is what you got, and I can't change my past. It is what we make of our future that counts."

With tender caresses and sweet kisses he soothes her until she is calm again. Not completely calm, though. Perversely, thinking of Tanya doing things to him turns her on. She looks at his forearm resting lightly on her chest, at the dark hairs on his wrist and in a blink she has brought that wrist to her lips, kissing it. Hairs so soft … she blows on them and feels him shuddering. She is all wet now and she knows he can smell her…

But he gently distances his body from hers.

"Bella, let me finish. I am almost done… I… I need it." And he resumes:

"My years as a killer had damaged me. Remorse was heavy and yet what I had seen of humanity did not endear it to me. I went through the motions: I got my medical degrees but did nothing with them. I played the piano and composed for some years, but did not do anything to make my work known outside. It was dangerous and not worth the risk; in the last years I didn't even play much. Yes, I studied, I learned languages, I went to college – much better than high school, of course - I even travelled the world and saw the sights, but it was as if I was looking at them through a glass wall. I did not belong to this reality but to a darker one. To be honest, there were lighter moments, good interactions with my family, but then something reminded me that I was alone and they had each other and I didn't know how to go on."

His last words end in a sob. Bella knows already of his long bleak years, but once again her heart contracts under his sorrow and she feels like crying. In fact a big fat tear escapes her eye, until he kisses it away.

"Edward," she says, repeating his words, "the past is past. It is what we make of our future that counts."

They embrace again, tight, and the dark cloud that was passing over him stars dispersing. Bella is here, with him, forever.

Now that he seems to have recovered, at least partially, she remembers how their conversation started, and, because she is nothing if not politically correct, she feels compelled to say:

"You know, there is nothing wrong with being gay."

"Indeed," he agrees, "I know it now, even if it took some time for me to understand it, but, aren't you happy that I am not, and not neuter either?"

As cool hands are now exploring her chest, caressing and cupping her breasts, his thumbs brushing her nipples, she tries to answer, but can only moan. Passion takes them. Giving way to something he has fantasized about more than once, he sets her prone and, placing a cushion under her belly, he slides into her from behind. Grasping the headboard and opening new cracks in it, he lets himself go – a little – overwhelmed by the pleasure this position gives him. God, he is behaving like an animal but, Bella seems to like it. A lot.

Spent, deeply satisfied, they lay in each other arms, silent for a while, until he says:

"Imagine if I was mated already, maybe to a male vampire… my love, your first day at Forks High would have been your last. I think that when I was driving to Denali like a bat from hell I already knew subconsciously that I had found my mate and that I could never kill you, despite the incredible call of your blood."

He sounds terrified, in retrospect. She knows that Alice Saw her broken and drained more than once, at the beginning of their relationship, and could not conceal her visions from him.

"Oh, but I was stubborn, wasn't I? Even after we had declared our reciprocal love, I still couldn't believe that we were really meant to be together. I was too dangerous, I was stealing your life, so eventually I left you. And, when I thought you were dead, my heart broke again. And when you saved me and forgave me for what I had done I still, I still…"

"You what?" she asks, because she is not sure where he is going now.

"I couldn't cope with my desires," he murmurs, so low that she barely hears him.

"At first I could not believe what was happening to me, blood lust and carnality were completely intertwined and I was sure that if I let go of an ounce of control I would take you forcefully and then kill you. "

"You wouldn't have," is Bella's retort, as she told him many, many times.

"But, it was so difficult to keep myself in check… even when, after Volterra, my desire for your blood had gone. I wanted you but was afraid I would hurt you and disgust you with my violence. Neuter my ass! With you I was all male and wholly heterosexual. I still don't know how I managed to lay with you night after night, resisting my urges, and frustrating your absolutely normal ones. Each night before I came to you and each dawn, going home I, I…" He realizes what he is about to tell her, but he must. No secrets, anymore.

"I had to take care of myself. Sometimes even during the night, when you were sleeping. "

Her reaction is surprising. Bella is beaming.

"Did you? I did the same, you know. Well, not every day, but when you were hunting. I fantasized about it… my predator. I was going mad with desire."

In fact, he had suspected as much, sometimes, and simply berated himself for being unable to give her what she wanted, what he wanted, dammit, so that she had to resort to… God, how stupid he had been. Was his condition to be married first really due to his ingrained Puritanism? Not that much, probably. It was a dilatory tactic, mostly. He was so scared… Idiot.

They look at each other and sweet relief washes over them. That fear is gone, forever.

Reclining nude at her side, he is the embodiment of perfection. Bella notices that his beautiful cock, something she is inclined to adore, is… limp, its tip lying placidly on his upper thigh. And this state of repose is so endearing. She would like to pet it, but has to restrain herself and the rush of tenderness that almost moves her hand. Because the moment she touches it will surely harden, which is its usual condition when they are together. Vampires, she is learning, don't need a long recovery time. Well, one day soon she won't too, hopefully.

However, there is something she is dying to ask, a curiosity that will have to be satisfied.

"Will you show me?"

"Show you what?"

"What you did … when you were alone and thinking of me." Damn blush.

"Yes." Edward answers, feeling incredibly liberated. Nothing he could do to Bella, with Bella or in front of Bella would shame him anymore. He is hers, totally at her disposal. As she is at his, so he adds:

"If you show me."

"Yes," she breaths.

"But not right now."

"No?"

"You need a nap. I'll make you lunch, while you sleep." Bella would protest but, he is right, she realizes. She i**s** very tired. He knows her body better that she does. And so she sleeps, basking in his love. In fact she is sleeping much more than usual since they came here…..

Endnotes

So, this is done. I could not refrain from writing it, a new two shots in my series "Growth". Please tell me your opinion. Many thanks to those who reviewed already.

Just if you wonder, the gay vampire Edward meets in New York is not the protagonist of "The Lure", because Angelo joined the Volturi in the early '50s, while the episode Edward is telling happened in the '20s. This lure had accompanied Eleazar to get hold of an American who seemed extraordinarily gifted, and had to be seduced to Volterra before his change, as for a newborn the Atlantic crossing would have been impossible.

And now, back to drafting The Parachutist' sequel. Since The Parachutist is the best story I wrote, if I say so myself, its sequel must be comparable and it is extremely difficult.


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